We live in an age where technology is the order of the day. Anything you want, you can get at the drop of a hat. You almost don't need to retain information in your brain because there is some device, gadget or app that will retain it for you. For example, my parents have a new residential phone number. I have no clue what it is. It's stored in my mobile phone if I need to dial them, but without my phone I would be unable to reach them. Sadly, if my head was on the chopping block and I had to recite my parents' home phone number or else, I would end up shorter by a head.
This made me realize that sometimes we do that with the Word of God. YouVersion has a great Bible app that is searchable, provides study tools and it even reads to you. There are a million and one (only a slight exaggeration) online sites that will allow you to find a verse with a few keystrokes. You can even google a phrase from a scripture and find out the passage reference in less than the time it would take to locate a physical Bible.
All of this is wonderful...but it makes me sad. We're not hiding the word in our hearts anymore. Just like phone numbers, we feel like we don't have to memorize scripture anymore because we can always find what we need in a flash. But the writer of Psalm 119 reminds us in verse 11 that hiding God's word in our hearts will keep us from sinning against God. In that moment when we are tempted, the Spirit of God will call back the Word to remembrance. Imagine if you had to find your app first...
It might be inconvenient, but hiding the Word in our hearts through scripture memorization will strengthen our walk. Let's endeavour to keep God's word hidden.
p.s. Nancy Leigh DeMoss has a 2012 challenge: memorize ALL of Psalm 119 by the end of the year. I'm trying it...will you?
This made me realize that sometimes we do that with the Word of God. YouVersion has a great Bible app that is searchable, provides study tools and it even reads to you. There are a million and one (only a slight exaggeration) online sites that will allow you to find a verse with a few keystrokes. You can even google a phrase from a scripture and find out the passage reference in less than the time it would take to locate a physical Bible.
All of this is wonderful...but it makes me sad. We're not hiding the word in our hearts anymore. Just like phone numbers, we feel like we don't have to memorize scripture anymore because we can always find what we need in a flash. But the writer of Psalm 119 reminds us in verse 11 that hiding God's word in our hearts will keep us from sinning against God. In that moment when we are tempted, the Spirit of God will call back the Word to remembrance. Imagine if you had to find your app first...
It might be inconvenient, but hiding the Word in our hearts through scripture memorization will strengthen our walk. Let's endeavour to keep God's word hidden.
p.s. Nancy Leigh DeMoss has a 2012 challenge: memorize ALL of Psalm 119 by the end of the year. I'm trying it...will you?
Thank you...God bless!
ReplyDeleteNot hiding the word of God in our hearts by memorizing would be terrible if we didn't know that the plan is to write the word in hearts of flesh by the Spirit. That's how we know that He's writing the same word in different hearts, even though the owners of those hearts memorize scriptures in Russian, Chinese, Portuguese, and every other language too. Fear not...
ReplyDeleteThanks for your comment Anderson. Good point.
ReplyDelete